


Thrymskvitha: Now with Schoolgirls!

by anno_Hreog



Category: The Avengers (2012), Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Mortal AU, Teenagers, Underage Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-12
Updated: 2012-10-23
Packaged: 2017-11-16 00:59:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/533735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anno_Hreog/pseuds/anno_Hreog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You know the story, where Loki dresses Thor as a bride to retrieve Mjolnir from the Frost Giants. </p><p>Now, with Freyja's stolen college ID, webcam hijinks, underage drinking, drugs, Tony Stark, schoolgirl outfits and Thor and Loki with their skirts flipped up on the boardroom table of Thrym & Associates. Yeah, and Mjolnir's a car.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, the fandom cycle began with [mustache90](http://mustache90.tumblr.com/)'s mindblowing [Thor in a schoolgirl skirt](http://mustache90.tumblr.com/post/32359488968) fanart, which induced a delirious little scribble, which I showed to daffenger, who went and made [Loki in a sailor uniform](http://daffenger.livejournal.com/18609.html). All good things... give you more and more things!
> 
>  
> 
> The timeline hops around and refuses to stay linear, flopping to way further back, to last year, to later last year, to now, to two years ago. You'll get it. Or not. 
> 
> Basically, it's the last two years of highschool. Stuff happens.

 

 

 

“Thor? Loki? Your Dad’s on his way home, and he wants to know what to get for takeout, Chinese or Indian – oh, my dear lord, what are you boys _wearing_?”

Frigga’s almost dropped the phone, so flabbergasted is she at the sight. With a household of two rowdy boys, a college girl dropping in with her laundry and friends any random day of the week, three geriatric cats, and a workaholic husband with a punishing schedule, Frigga’s not the type to get bowled over easily.

Frigga’s sure there’s a perfectly good reason why her teenage sons are decked out in sailor-style schoolgirl uniforms. Why Loki’s curled up on Thor’s bed unhappily chewing on his cuticle while Thor’s spooning him and stroking his hair as if Loki’s just escaped from a mob of hungry zombie villagers. Why there’s a smudge of candy-pink lipgloss on Thor’s mouth. A perfectly good explanation for that one fat tear rolling down Loki’s cheek.

But right now, Frigga doesn’t ask. When Thor looks up and goes, _later, Mom, later, please?_ with just a look, she backs out of the room and quietly closes the door, shaking her head. It’s not like Loki’s her sweet little boy any more. He doesn’t come running to her with his hundred-and-one questions and fists full of flowers from the neighbor’s garden and the boo-boo on his knee from falling down. He’s fifteen. He’s not likely to go running to anyone with his problems any more. So maybe she’s just grateful he still has Thor.

Besides, they’re just boys. How much trouble could they get into?

 

§

 

It all started when Loki bet Mjölnir and lost.

No, actually, it started with the fake IDs.

No, wait, before that. It was because Thor started playing online poker with those guys from the law firm, and Loki turned it into strip poker.

No. It began with Freyja’s webcam.

We could go all the way back to the beginning, if there is such a thing. Loki says all their problems started before he was even born – wait for it, wait for it – with _Thor_ being born, period. No, wait, with Odin and Frigga having The Sex – _la la la, I can’t hear you_ , shouts Thor. ‘Cause what does Loki care? He’s adopted. Mom and Dad didn’t have to do all that degrading naked stuff to make _him._

Anyway, here’s how the story goes.

 

§

 

No matter what Loki says, Freyja is _not_ actually a sex maniac.

She’s a perfectly normal nice girl in college, twenty-years old, and majoring in business. Just because she has long, curly red-gold hair, a heart-shaped face, sky-blue eyes, and a perfect cheerleader’s figure (if it weren’t for those unfortunately luscious D-cups), it doesn’t mean she’s a sex maniac. Or a nympho lesbo vampire. Or a _cauldron of hot sweet love_. All these phrases have been banned in the Fjorgynn-Borsson household. Because Loki wore them out, and they weren’t even funny the first time. Thanks a lot, Loki. Thor had been dying to say nympho lesbo vampire, just once.

Still, _cauldron of hot sweet love_ put a smile on Freyja’s face when nothing else would. She happens to think Loki is cute and funny, despite his disturbing abuse of the English language. 

Which doesn’t get him very far because they’re cousins. It’s not like he’s given up, though.

“Yeah, and that wouldn’t be gross at all,” says Thor. He’s slicing a banana into his bowl. He’s one of those freaky individuals who pour their milk first, prepare everything else, and _then_ their breakfast cereal of choice, because the cereal gets less soggy that way.

“But she’s _hot!”_ says Loki, for whom _hot_ is a reason to ignore the incest taboo, a time-honored convention that has prevailed in most civilizations, and the general ick factor involved. “Besides,” he adds, “she’s not _my_ cousin. _I’m_ adopted.”

He uses ‘adopted’ as an excuse for everything, none of them good.

“You’re my brother,” says Thor for the squinty-billionth time. “And she’s _our_ cousin.”

“I’d do _you_ ,” says Loki, and Thor’s breath hitches and the rest of his banana _kerplunk_ s into the milk, “if you were even remotely hot. _Yeti_ ,” Loki finishes with a smirk.

And Thor shoves him off the stool.

“Hey! I was in the middle of _cereal!_ ” Loki complains, like Capt’n Crunch has been seriously disrespected by Thor’s respecting of the honor of their family. And Yetis.

 

§

 

Freyja first came to live with them four years ago, after her parents died. It was a skiing accident in Gstaad, and even rich people have everyday tragedies to muck up their lives. Back then, Freyja still had a thick Norwegian accent, and her English was really bad, and she barely spoke to anyone. She sat with her head bowed and her hair falling over to hide her face. Everyone walked on eggshells around her. Because she was so lovely, and so sad.

Everyone, that is, except Loki. Because – you guessed it – she was hot. Also, he never learned how to shut up. Or how to stop poking at things when he was curious, until they blew up in his face. The saying, ‘Curiosity killed the cat,’ was banned in their house, too, because it scared Frigga. You’d be scared too, if your boy was that cat.

The first time they heard Freyja laugh was when she found Loki sitting on her bed with her lacy apple-green bra on backwards. (When he thinks about it, the latest mess should not have come as a surprise to Thor.) Loki wasn’t even supposed to be in her room. Odin caught him three times before and dragged him out by the ear each time. Loki’s casual disregard of everyone else’s privacy but his own was never really an issue when it was just Loki and Thor, but it was different now, with a girl in the house.

“It’s not what you think. I can explain. They’re my cauldrons of hot sweet love,” Loki started babbling, but Freyja just grabbed him for a hug. A long, tight hug. Thor was going to the bathroom when he saw the whole thing go down from the open doorway. How her face crumpled up like she was trying not to cry and then… and then, it turned into a giggle. At first Thor thought she was crying again, and was ready to march right in and kick his little snot-rag of a brother in the face.

(These days, Thor doesn’t so much want to _kick_ Loki’s face as much as _—_ never mind.)

But Freyja was laughing.

And Loki… well, that sneaky little brat hadn’t let his own mother hug him since the second grade, but hugs were okay when he had his face buried between Freyja’s breasts? And that _look_ on his face…! Later, Freyja let him practice unhooking a bra with one hand – she wore it over her sweater for that. It would be useful for when Loki had a girlfriend. Loki spent the rest of the afternoon running up and down the stairs with Freyja’s bra over _his_ sweater, until Odin came home and yelled at him to take it off. But after that, Freyja smiled and laughed.

She even got a nice, serious boyfriend in high school, who took her to his senior prom and they had sex afterwards at the Ritz. It wasn’t as if she was a virgin. She's Norwegian. Freyja told Loki all about it afterwards.

“He is very sweet. A little boring, but sweet. Boys, you have to train them. Good at heart is better than good at penis.” She frowned at that. “But Odr, he is a fast learner.”

Odr’s at Stanford now, and they’re engaged. Freyja’s at Georgetown, which makes Frigga and Odin happy because she’s just an hour away across the Potomac. Still, Freyja’s a good girlfriend; she and Odr only broke up five times so far. They skype every night when they can. Freyja even has a webcam for that.

“Can you imagine what she uses it for?” Loki wonders when she first brings her laptop home from college. That was last year.

“To talk to her boyfriend,” Thor tells him, rolling his eyes.

“To talk to her boyfriend in the _nude_ ,” Loki said, in his best _you’re an idiot, Thor_ voice. “Talking to her boyfriend with _her top off_. Talking to her boyfriend with her fingers in the pudding –”

“Shut up, you pervert,” said Thor, grabbing Loki in a headlock.

“You’re the pervert!” yelped Loki. “Let go of me, pervert! Mom! Thor’s _touching_ me!”

“I am _not!_ ”

Thor let go of Loki like he was on fire.

It’s around that time that Thor starts jacking off to the image of his girlfriend Sif, and ends up sticky and confused and with the image of his brother stuck in his head. That secret is _so_ going to the grave with him. If Loki ever finds out…. 

If Loki ever finds out, he’d exchange kisses and dirty touches for all of Thor’s things, and then blackmail Thor into being his slave, make him sleep in the empty doghouse in the back yard and drag him around on a leash like a bad puppy. Okay, so maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. Sometimes, Thor jacks off to that fantasy, too.

So, it really isn’t Thor’s idea to hijack Freyja’s webcam feed.

Curiosity, winning an argument, and breasts. These were a few of Loki’s favorite things. It’s not like Thor even knows how to do that kind of thing. He’s more into Government, History, and sneaking out to play soccer with the guys. It’s not like Loki knows how to do it either. He’s more into cheating and cramming.

“How does this work again?” asks Thor, and Loki’s crowding his side to stare into the teeny tiny screen on his netbook.

“Like you’d understand if I told you,” says Loki, snottily. He’s got coffee breath; it’s pretty strong. It’s not like Thor’s sniffing him or anything.

“You went to Starbucks?” asks Thor. The feed’s frozen, and Loki keeps dragging the external mouse over his knee like that’s going to help.

Loki shrugs. “I was getting some Calculus tutoring.”

“You don’t need Calculus tutoring,” says Thor. “I could have helped you with Calculus.”

Loki gives him a scathing look. He doesn’t say the obvious – that Thor’s repeating his junior year, and that he’s in Loki’s class.

“Who with?” Thor asks.

Loki doesn’t answer.

“Who with?”

“Shut up. Just some senior. Hey, it’s coming on,” says Loki. He’s chewing the green Starbucks straw ragged. “There it is! There it is!”

It’s like aliens landed in their backyard, he’s so excited. The little window unfreezes, and they bump heads when the feed comes through. It’s Freyja all right, but, duh, she’s wearing her red Hoyas hoodie and getting potato chip crumbs all over the front. She’s telling Odr about some boring lecture she attended.

“See?” says Thor. “They’re just talking. She’s not doing anything weird.” The hoodie clashes horribly with her red hair, and the camera makes her face look washed out and a bit green.

“Shut up, Thor. You can’t see where her other hand is,” says Loki. “I believe her delicate fingertips are strumming for nirvana right now. In the vagi – ”

“They’re right outside the screen, where the keyboard should be.”

“You’re ruining a perfectly good fantasy, Thor. ‘Should be’ doesn’t mean anything –”

“You can tell from the angle of her arm—”

“La la la, I can’t hear you.”

“What senior?” Thor asks again. “Was it a girl? Did you get her to hotwire the webcam thing? Is that what it was about? Do you even like her?”

Loki rolls his eyes. “ _Hotwire_ the webcam thing,” he scoffs instead of answering. Like he even knows how to do this stuff himself.

 

§

 

Loki’s fifteen now and Thor’s three years older. They’re both seniors, but Loki’s skipped two grades. Thor had nothing but straight A’s for three years before he up and failed three classes and had to repeat his junior year. That was almost two years ago. Odin always knows when Thor’s up to something, and he knew back then too.

His father took him down to the rec room in the basement and gave him twenty strokes with the belt over the back of his thighs while Thor counted, and pulled the truth out of him.

They always agree on a number beforehand, and Odin makes it a rule never to strike him in anger. He’s never laid a hand on Loki, only Thor. Sometimes Odin’s so cold with Thor, it makes him wonder if _he’s_ not the adopted one.

 

§

 

“You’re not stupid, and you’re not distracted,” his father was saying. “Your grades were perfect, and you go and do this. Why did you do this? Are you on drugs?”

“What?” Thor can’t believe this. “No! Are you crazy?”

Odin’s glare quells him, and for a moment he stops tugging the belt through the loops, like Thor’s got another five coming if he doesn’t watch it.

“I mean, no, sir,” mumbles Thor.

His father gives him considering glance.

“And now, you’ll have to repeat your junior year,” he says slowly. “And your brother’s skipping another grade, so he will be in his third year. With you.”

Thor looks away, wiping the sweat from his face. He pulls his jeans back on, and his tender skin smarts against the denim.

“You were waiting for your brother to catch up, so you wouldn’t leave for college without him.”

Thor nods, and Odin sighs heavily.

“This isn’t the way.” Odin sits down on the old wingback chair that’s been banished to the rec room. He looks surprised when the back reclines and the footrest pops out.

“Lay-Z-Boy,” Thor tells him, smothering a grin. “Looks are deceptive.”

Odin growls at him – literally growls, the crazy old coot, Thor thinks.

“I’ll lazy-boy, you, you mindless thug. How do you expect to get into Harvard after failing high school?” his voice grows harder at the rebellious look on Thor’s face.

Thor shrugs. “I’ll go somewhere else, then.”

“Loki’s going to Harvard.”

“Says you,” mutters Thor.

“He’s a good boy,” says Odin. “He listens to his father. He’s going to Harvard. And so will you. Unless you’re willing to ruin your chances completely. He can go without you, then. Is that what you want?”

Thor sighs. “No, sir.”

Good grades are hard work on his part, but it’s the lovely boost of legacy that will do the final trick. Three generations at the helm of the Crimson and the Borsson chair in Classics endowed by grandfather’s will mean Thor and Loki are shoe-ins with the admissions office. If Thor doesn’t fail high-school that is. And Loki will. Go to Harvard without Thor, that is.

“I know you want to look out for your brother,” says Odin, shaking his head. “But you’re setting a bad example. You should have come to me first. You could have deferred a year to work for me.”

“Sorry, father,” mumbles Thor. Yeah, that would have been a smarter plan.

“We’ll make up for this or it will look bad,” says Odin. “You will repeat your junior year with perfect grades, understood?”

Thor nods. “Yes, sir.”

“And senior year as well. No senior slump for you. This summer and the next, you’re working in my office.”

“Yes, father.”

“Then, you and your brother can drive up to Cambridge together. No more flunking, keep your grades up, hard work, and no more trouble. Agreed?”

“Yes, sir.”

Thor nods, and they shake on it. Odin gives him a hearty smack on the back to show there are no hard feelings, and Thor winces. He saves the whimpering for later when he’s in his room, jeans shucked off and lying on his stomach.

Loki’s rubbing a piece of melting ice over his reddened thighs, his slim fingers cold and wet over Thor’s skin. Thor closes his eyes, willing himself to be still as his brother kneels besides him, frowning at the angry red marks.

“Really, Thor?” Loki’s voice is scathing. “Tighty-whities?” He sneaks a piece of ice under the band, and it slips into the crack of buttocks. A trickle of icewater shoots down to his balls.

“ _Yeeeeessh!”_

“I got it! I got it!” Loki’s yelping, and his thin fingers scramble for the piece of ice, careless that he’s rooting inside Thor’s underpants, ghosting over his sensitive parts, and Thor’s thinking about grandma Bestla who soaks her dentures in her scotch, old Dr Kvasir who smells like glue and mothballs, Big Bird, double cheeseburgers, Odin, Odin, Odin – anything not to cream in his pants right now.

He drags himself up by the elbows and turns to sit up, wincing at the weave of the quilt under him. His underpants are halfway off his buttocks, and Loki’s staring at the bulge of his dick.

“Wow, Thor,” he says slowly. “You’re completely hung like a Clydesdale. No wait, nix that. Like an elephant.”

“And factor in the shrinkage, too,” says Thor, grinning and putting his hands behind his head. “Like what you see?”

“It’s not a compliment, moron,” says Loki. “With a dong that huge, you’re practically _deformed_. Does Sif even know? Can I tell her? _Virgin_ ,” he coughs into his fist.

“Sif not only knows, she knows _biblically,_ ” Thor says, laughing at him. He slept with Sif when he was fifteen. Loki’s just fourteen, and as far as Thor knows, he’s not slept with anyone. “You’re just jealous. Let’s have a peek now, pencil dick.”

“ _Pencil dick?_ Just because I’m not walking around with a misshapen _turnip_ stuffed in my crotch –”

“At least I’m a turnip. What are you? Pickle? Edamame? A string bean?” Thor’s having too much fun now. “No, wait. You’re a… _cherry.”_

 _“A what?!”_ Loki’s indignation is undercut by his juvenile squawk.

“You heard it. _Cherry_. Loki’s a girl,” says Thor singsong, and in a flash Loki yanks down his sweatpants. No tighty-whities for him. He’s going commando.

“See?” says Loki. “Eggplant, at the very least.”

Thor’s mouth goes dry, and he swallows hard, but he looks. Nestled in a bed of springy black pubes, perfect, like the rest of him.

“Mine’s bigger,” says Thor finally.

“Mine’s prettier,” counters Loki, “way, way, way prettier,” and pulls up his sweatpants. “Ugh, put it away. It’s hideous. You’re making my eyeballs shrivel.”

Thor gingerly tugs his underpants back up, and settles down on his stomach again. “Really? That ugly, huh?” he says, a hint of wistfulness in his voice. He knows he’s playing the three-legged puppy card. It works every time.

Loki frowns, and picking up another icecube from the bowl, rubs it slowly over Thor’s welts again. Thor sighs happily as the coolness sinks into him.

“Fine,” says Loki. “You won’t _completely_ empty out the boys’ locker room with that horror. You’re no Tony Stark, though,” his brother adds, absently.

“Tony Stark?” he growls.

He knows who Tony Stark is. Another good thing about repeating a year is not being seniors with Tony Stark. Tony Stark’s just fourteen same as Loki, skipping grades, mouthing off, the sort of useless, flashy, loud, pretty boy type that – wait a minute.

Loki is humming the school song, though it’s deliberately missing a beat so Thor knows he’s replacing ‘glory’ with ‘gloryhole’ in his head.

“Are you into boys now?” he asks, trying to sound casual. He has to be careful. He has to be sensitive and understanding. “Are you… Loki, are you gay?”

Loki makes a derisive sound and refuses to answer for a while.

“Your friend Fandral is _gay_ ,” sneers Loki. “Uncle Vili is _gay._ The purple _teletubby_ is gay _._ _I_ am _discriminating_. I like pretty breasts. And now, I will allow for pretty pricks. All manner of lovely cheekbones and pert buttocks are allowed to grace themselves before me, male, female, both, neither. I, Loki Borsson,” Loki announces grandly, “am _beautiful-sexual_.”

Thor’s snickering into his quilt.

“Loki,” he tells his brother. “You’re an idiot.”

“And you’re _ugly_ , Thor.”

He’s really not.

 

§

 

So, doing his junior year over again isn’t that bad. 

Half of Thor’s classes are with his brother. After years of Loki being the bright one, the clever one, the little star who’s skipped grades, making it look easy, it’s Thor who’s really coasting this time. Though Thor’s bored out of his mind half the time because he knows this stuff already. He goes through every SAT prep book ever and burns through his practice tests. One thing Odin isn’t stingy on is books and stuff for school. It’s like a game for Thor, like target practice, or puzzles. Or sudoku. _2310, 2270, 2340. 2400. Score!_

He even offers to coach Loki to get better SAT scores. Loki says he’d rather suck donkey dick.

“Like that ass, Tony Stark?” jokes Thor.

Loki doesn’t laugh with him, and suddenly there’s this sick hole in Thor’s gut. It’s around this time that Loki starts going to Starbucks a lot. He’s not paying for all those lattes himself.

 

§

 

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

  
  


 

[Loki’s junior year. Thor is a junior. Again.]

 

Sif's asked him to her senior prom, though not the way they'd envisioned it last year because Thor won't be graduating with all his friends. Anyway, it’s not like Sif’s asking a _junior_ junior.

Loki spritzs soda all over his shirt laughing. He’s plopping ice cubes into a tumbler where he’s mixed Mountain Dew, Cherry Coke, and Red Bull into one hyper-caffeinated mega-drink. Loki gets this little smile on his face when he drops a single maraschino cherry in it, like it’s the sweet glowy heart center. He thinks Thor doesn’t know he calls it ‘the Tony’ in secret.

“Poor, poor Sif,” Loki’s saying. “Once you take a _junior_ to the prom, it’s all downhill from there. She’ll never recover from that embarrassing social _faux pas_. I can see it now, ugly glasses, moose sweaters, sad sad crushes on middle-aged professors, a desperate fling with the Bengali TA. It’s an apartment full of cats for her. Sif’s only a pretend cougar and you’re not even fresh meat.”

Thor rolls his eyes. “We’re the same age. She’s my girlfriend.”

“You think she’s going to still be your girlfriend when she’s off at college?” Loki’s trying to stake the cherry with his straw. It keeps bobbing up. “Don’t be naïve, Thor. Sif’s on the bullet train to _Girls Gone Wild_. We need to get those videos now. All of them for the next four years just to check. She’s sure to be in one of them, maybe all of them. It’ll be for research purposes.”

“Don’t buy porn on Dad’s credit card. You’re so getting a whaling next time,” Thor tells him. “And I thought you said Sif’s going to end up a sad old cat lady.”

“All the sad old cat ladies used to be on _Girls Gone Wild,_ Thor, keep up,” Loki says. “The touch of mortal man will never be enough for her lady parts after that. She needs a more agile tongue. Only our feline friends have the power, the drive, the special draw to fishiness --”

Thor burst out laughing. He drinks up the rest of Loki’s Mountain Dew and pops another tab. “You,” he tells his brother. “Are disgusting. No wonder you don’t have a girlfriend. Have fun watching _Star Wars_ while all the big kids are at the prom.”

Loki makes a face at him, and slurps the cherry out of his drink. He’s doing something weird with the stem with his tongue.

 

 

[Their senior year]

 

There’s this weird program on Loki’s netbook that turns Loki into a girl. It runs when he turns on the webcam.

Actually, it works for Thor, too.

Instead of his own face, there’s a chesty blonde girl staring back at him on the screen, blue eyes wide and anime. Girl Thor follows his movements mirror-like, as he turns his face left and right, holds up his right hand, sticks out his tongue. That’s definitely Thor’s face, Thor's nose and Thor's eyes, but she’s not wearing Thor’s t-shirt.

My, my grandma what huge jugs you’ve got.

It’s weird feeling up his non-existent chest for the webcam, but the girl Thor on the screen has more to work with. G-cups at the very least – are they even a thing? – they’re each the size of his anime girl's head.

“Wow, Thor, you’re like the ugliest girl I’ve ever seen.”

He didn’t hear Loki come in. Hurriedly, Thor fumbles with the keyboard, trying to turn the program off. The screen freezes instead, mid-grope, little anime mouth open in an obscene “ _oh!”_ There's sweat on her shiny bursty anime boobs.

Loki leans over him. His breath tickles Thor’s cheek. He considers the anime girl Thor on the screen.

“Still, I’d fuck you if you had knockers. Maybe you could wear a bag over your head,” he says, making rapid clicks on the buttons on the sidebar.

The screen starts moving again, and there’s anime girl Loki looking over his shoulder. Thor’s caught between this dizzy heat what with feeling his brother so close, and wanting to move out of the way so he can see what Loki’s breasts look like. Right, not his actual breasts. Breasts on an anime girl Loki on the computer program.

“You made this?” he asks, and Loki doesn’t answer him, just keeps clicking. Girl Thor is switching through three catalogues worth of Victoria's Secret. Now she’s wearing a silver bustier and red panties and matching garters. The nipples show through pink under the silver mesh, and her chest is moving in interesting ways. Oh right, he’s breathing way too hard. Got to calm down.

“You should grow out your hair. It looks good on you. Maybe I’ll fuck you anyway. We can keep the cam on, and we’ll be two girls. That would be really hot,” Loki says, his tongue ghosting up Thor’s ear.

Thor swings around on the computer chair and grabs him by the wrists and throws him down on the floor. Loki’s kicking at him every which way, the dirty fighter that he is, and Thor wrestles him down, planting one knee on either side and straddling him.

“What’s the matter with you?” he demands. “What’s going on? Why are you being like this?

“Get off me, you troll!” Loki tries to buck him off, and Thor sits on him harder for emphasis. “I _really_ don’t like you that way, Thor!”

“Is it that Stark kid?” says Thor. “Is he messing with you? Did he _hurt_ you? I’ll kill him!”

“It’s not… it’s not like that … shut up, shut up! What do you know? You don’t know anything!” yells Loki and knees him in the groin.

Thor’s head is a blank, white place full of pain and terrible screaming silence, and he’s rolling on his back groaning and moaning. Loki snaps the netbook shut and runs out of the room with it.

Later that week when Thor barges into Loki’s room, he finds his little brother tangled up with Tony Stark on his bed. Neither of them are wearing pants. It’s really not what he’s expecting. So yeah, he’s kind of caught off guard.

“What are you doing here?” demands Thor. “Aren’t you supposed to be at college?”

Stark, that little shithead, just rolls his eyes at him, flips him the bird, and goes right back to sucking Loki’s face, right up to the moment Thor grabs him and throws him out the window. He slides off the roof of the breakfast room and rolls into the hedges. Thor hides a smirk at the sound of yelping. Good, those hedges needed clipping.

Thor’s not mean. He generously tosses Stark's jeans after him.

“Hey!” shouts Loki, with a corresponding “Hey!” rising up from the back yard. The little pipsqueaks, thinks Thor. Their voices are still breaking, and they're fooling around? They’re too young for this sort of thing.

“It’s a school night!” he yells out at Stark.

 

 

[The end of Thor’s repeat junior year]

 

Thor doesn’t rent a tux. It’s not his prom exactly, but all his friends are graduating, so he’s happy to be going. Even if he and Sif know she’s off to swim in bigger seas now. They’re friends, and they’ll stay friends, and that’s enough.

He wears his family dinners sports jacket, and gets a camellia corsage for Sif. Frigga takes pictures, and even Odin grunts his approval at the perfect picture they make. Odin knows Sif’s father, it’s that kind of thing.

They’re ready to go when the doorbell rings again, and Loki’s running down the stairs three steps at a time. “I’ll get it! I’ll get it! It’s for me!”

Loki’s wearing a jacket too, and the joke bowtie with the goats on it that Thor got him in sixth grade. He smells like he fell in a tub of _Old Spice_.

“Why are you all dressed up?” Thor asks him, but Loki runs past him to the door, and swings it open, grinning.

There’s a girl standing there, a tall, gangly girl, teetering dangerously in four-inch heels, with wild frizzy red hair, braces, and about a gazillion freckles. Loki smiles at her, all teeth, like a happy shark.

“Mom, Dad, this is Virginia –”

“Pepper,” says the girl.

“—my date,” says Loki proudly. “She’s a senior, and she’s super cool, and she’s going to Brown. We're going to the prom together. She's my date."

"Yeah, yeah, we heard you the first time, Cinderella." Thor stares at the girl. “Do you even go to our school?” says Thor, and Sif smacks him on the arm.

“Hello, Thor,” says Pepper. “And yes, I sat behind you for two years in English.”

Loki’s fiddling with her corsage, pulling out the little pink rosebuds and putting them in her hair instead. They clash with her awful hair, but Loki’s saying something in her ear and Pepper laughs. Thanks to the last growth spurt, he’s almost as tall as she is in her heels.

“You know he’s underage, right?” says Thor, and Frigga smacks him on the other arm. 

Odin just laughs, slings his arms over his boys. “Bring them back in one piece, ladies.”

Awkward would be a generous call for that ride to the prom.

Sif’s glaring at Thor, and Thor’s staring at this Pepper girl and trying to figure out what she has to do with anything, and Loki’s oblivious and keeps whispering stuff to her, and she’s trying not to laugh so hard.

And what really kicks it is that she’s totally flunking in the breasts department. Sif smacks him on the arm again when Thor tries to check out her ass when they get out. It’s not like that. Really. Pepper’s practically a stick.

Loki’s not tried to grope her once. He keeps jumping up to get her punch and dances all the jiggedy electric pop numbers with her. He's not even copping a feel. It’s suspicious and no one else seems to think it is.

It’s only when Tony Stark makes his entrance that everything clicks and starts looking like reality, in that horrible way when you realize there’s no Santa Claus, poverty is here to stay, and no one’s figured out what to do about the Middle East for about sixty million years.

Tony Stark has a blonde model on each arm, a guy and a girl, and he’s wearing rose-colored sunglasses, the _ass_. It’s night out, for pete’s sake. He takes over the DJ’s table and for the craziest while it’s like a laser show in here. The punch is spiked and flowing.

The night, surprisingly, gets better.

Thor and Sif dance every dance, and then Thor dances with Fandral because Sif told him Fandral’s had a crush on him for about forever. Hogun’s parents didn’t let him come to the prom, but that’s okay because he’s going to sneak out later, steal his Dad’s car and join them by lake, and then they’ll be _wishing_ they let him go to the prom.

It’s the last time they’re going to be in high school together. After this… well, after this, Thor’s going back to high school. He made the choice. He signed up for sticking with his little brother, no matter what.

What he didn’t sign up for was Tony Stark taking over the after party by the lake. His friends don’t mind, the traitors. Stark, that little shit brought booze, in all the colors of the rainbow. _Stolichnaya, Johnny Walker Red, Tanqueray,_ vermouth, rum, bourbon, brandy and lots and lots of cranberry juice and orange juice. It’s like he has a bar in the trunk of his car.

Pepper’s sitting on the plaid blanket sipping at a plastic cup and looking out at the lights dancing on the lake. She smiles at Thor and gives him a sniff of her drink. Orange juice. Virgin. He's not going to read more into that.

“I'm the designated driver,” she says with a shrug. “Amongst other things. Tony asked me to ask your brother, and I didn’t have a date anyway. Don’t look so sorry for me. I got to come along for once. Run with the cool kids? And this fall at Brown, I’ll be majoring in French and Art History and Business, and nothing about high school will ever matter in life again,” she says with a bright smile, unmarred even by all that metal and plastic, and under all those freckles, she's actually sort of pretty.

He clinks plastic cups with her, and the vodka burns in the back of his throat. On the other side, Hogun sits down next to Pepper and stares grimly out at the lake. Thor can take a hint. He gets up and goes wandering.

They’ve got a bonfire going, and the air smells of pine and being young forever, and he makes out with Sif and they catch their breath laughing.

“I’m going to miss this,” says Sif.

“What? Getting drunk and feeling up your boyfriend?” asks Thor. “I don’t know what they’ve told you about college, miss, but –”

She laughs and swats at him. Her hair's come down, mussed up and soft, and he knows what she means, all this, being together, the whole gang, feeling secure and part of something.

“You guys, get a room!” Fandral yells, and Thor’s about to yell back at him when he realizes it’s not at him and Sif.

“My eyes, my eyes,” wails Fandral, who’s not only not turning away, he’s avidly watching Tony Stark despoil Thor’s little brother on a clan Douglas tartan. Loki’s shirt is undone and when he comes up for air his lips are red and swollen and he lets out a weak kittenish sigh. Stark’s feeling him up through his trouser fronts, and Loki’s helping him unbutton --

“If you think about it, it’s practically child pornography, isn’t it?” Fandral’s saying. “Watching those two going at it. They’re what? Fourteen?”

“Fifteen,” growls Thor, but before he can stalk down there and tear that filthy lothario public bicycle walking STD off his precious little brother, Sif grabs him by the arm.

“Don’t,” she says, and Thor turns on her, furious.

  
"What?!"

“Don’t, Thor,” Sif says again, holding her ground. “Leave him alone. You’re not his father.”

She doesn’t get it, Sif doesn’t. Odin doesn’t _care,_ not really, as long as Loki doesn’t act out, and Loki’s too smart, too sneaky to act out in a way he’ll get caught. Someone has to look out for him, and there’s only Thor, and there’ll always only be Thor looking out for Loki.

Loki’s crawled up onto Tony Stark’s lap and they’re dry humping each other, the desperate little sex maniacs, and they’re going to blow their loads any second now when Loki, wrapped all around Tony Stark like a sex-starved orangutan, gasps like he’s Romeo and Juliet all rolled up in one with a suicide pact carved on his arm.

“I love you, Tony, fuck, I love you, love you, love you.”

Tony Stark doesn’t say it back, and Thor’s going to beat him to a pulp if he doesn’t think it’s actually a good thing that Loki gets a clue early on. Only Tony Stark’s hand is down his brother’s pants, and Loki's moaning and rubbing up against it, and Thor's really not staying here to watch that. And Fandral isn’t either.

He’s dragging his friend away, not listening to Loki panting hard on Tony Stark, and Tony Stark murmuring stuff and nonsense and laughing softly and making wet disgusting noises with his mouth on _his_ brother.

Thor's thinking, he's going to skip the prom when he's a senior.

So, after not even being man enough to ask his brother to the prom, like a _date_ date, it’s just like Tony Stark to take it as a _bona fide_ marriage proposal when, later that summer Loki hacks into Tony’s account and sends a mass e-mail to the entire student body at MIT, reminding them that Anthony J. Stark, entering freshman, will be fifteen-years old and therefore any attempt to date him would be seen as statutory rape under Massachusetts law, and the offender will be prosecuted until he was _dead_.

“Aw, baby, you forgot to include the professors,” says Stark, and Loki decks him with a sofa cushion, letting his little Mario cart careen off the rainbow racetrack with a sad little electronic squeal.

They’re still messing around on the sofa when Thor walks in, and _he’s_ not embarrassed so _he’s_ not leaving. This is _his_ house. Thor plants himself firmly on Dad’s armchair and stares at the TV which is stuck on ‘Game Over’ with the digital theme song playing over and over again.

He can _hear_ the two of them go still, feel Loki’s exasperated glare from where he’s crushed lying under Tony Stark.

Stark, his stupid hair sticking up in a stupid way that Loki can’t seem to stop petting, sits up, grins at Thor, and sticks out his hand, like they’ve just met at one of Odin’s important functions.

“So, hey, welcome to the family,” says Stark, then laughs. “Wait, wait a minute, I think that’s _your_ line.”

Thor can’t wait for Fall when Tony Stark disappears into the black hole that is MIT and it’s just Thor and Loki again.

 

 

[And we’re back to senior year]

 

It's crazy hopping around, filling in stuff, re-writing essays, re-re-writing essays, checking their recommendations and scores. And Thor's stuck in this panicked pressure cooker with the world's most hyperactive college applicant ever who just won't stop obsessing about that A - he got in Biology in sophomore year.

 

But then, after they’ve sent in their college applications, it’s dead boring. Thor’s friends are all at college, and Loki never had friends. It’s bad enough to be fifteen and in high school. It’s about ten-thousand times worse when you’re three years younger than everyone else.

They end up playing online poker a lot. There’s better money than in blackjack where Loki keeps getting kicked out for counting cards.

Loki’s found that if he uses the girl avatar, he gets invited to a lot of higher stakes poker games. Those guys aren’t completely stupid though. They want proof that he’s really a girl. The anime stripteases are okay, but they want to know there's a real girl behind the program.

He sends them a scan of Freyja’s college ID. Girl Loki’s anime features are based on her anyway. With bigger breasts of course.

Thor wants to tell him off, but things with Loki have been on creaky wheels lately, so he’s not pushing it. Throwing Stark out (the window) was probably not a very good idea. It felt _great_ though.

Thor’s using the extra cash to fix up Mjolnir, their ~~rusty grey~~ silver Mustang. That’s another thing that’s driven a wedge between them. Mjolnir was supposed to be for both of them. Odin paid for half of it, the other half came from Thor and Loki's meagre savings.  
  
But Loki’s failed his road test three times, and Odin put his foot down: No more driving lessons until he gets his acceptance letter. So Mjolnir’s Thor’s for now. Forever.

He’s the one putting work on her. The new paint job, the new tires, the tune up, the oil change, a new transmission. He’s elbows deep in engine grease these days, figuring how she runs, how she turns, how she brakes, how she hums as she kicks into third gear. Gorgeous.

Loki’s starting to hate cars. He swears he’s going to boycott driving for good, and he hates Mjolnir like a spiteful girlfriend. Thor half-expects the tires to be slashed every morning he goes out to check her out. Loki would never be that obvious though.

But things come to a head when the early decision letters come rolling in.

Thor’s been accepted to Harvard.

Loki’s been waitlisted.

Loki pitches a tantrum to beat all tantrums and storms out of the house.

He’s just blowing off steam, Frigga says. She’s worried about what Odin will say, and she’s got a whole speech prepared. Loki’s applied to other schools. Stanford, Yale, Amherst, Princeton, the University of Toronto. Perhaps he’ll want to take a gap year and travel. They could go to India together. He's always wanted to do that, and Frigga thinks it'll be good for him. He’s still her little boy.

 

When Odin comes home, he shakes Thor’s hand and says “Good work.” Then goes straight for the whiskey cabinet. He’s staring at Loki’s waitlist letter from Harvard, and muttering, going through the list of people he can call to make the push. Frigga says they should wait. Loki could still get in. They should wait and see if he gets in on his own steam first.

Odin snorts at that and steadily pours himself more scotch.

It’s late, and Frigga leaves her phone with Thor. Loki’s been sending in his dutiful little boy texts every half hour, so she won’t think he’s been kidnapped and chopped up into teeny tiny little pieces.

“Your father needs to get some sleep,” she says, a slurring, swaying Odin draped over her shoulders. “Stay up and make sure your brother has something to eat before he goes to bed.”

Around eleven, Thor grabs his jacket and heads down the street. Odin’s Mercedes and Frigga’s Land Rover take up the two car garage. Mjolnir’s parked around the block.

It’s not like a beat-up fixer-upper like Mjolnir’s going to have a car alarm. It’s not like anyone even comes out when a car alarm goes off.

But there’s his car, and his kid brother in the front seat. Thor gets in next to him, and it takes all of the last five hours of worry and guilt and hating his father that he doesn’t yell. Because Loki’s torn out the electrical system, the wires are hanging out of like Cthhulu's beard, and his fingers are a fucking bleeding mess.

He doesn’t look up at Thor, only keeps trying to twist wires together.

“It looks so easy in the movies, hotwiring a car.”

“You don’t even know how to drive,” says Thor, and he takes Loki’s right hand to stop him from tearing up the skin more. Loki bleeds into Thor’s palm.

“How hard can it be?” he says, sniffling. “Idiots drive. Left pedal for go, right pedal for stop. Middle one, jigglely wiggley.”

“It’s the other way around,” Thor corrects him gently. “Jiggley wiggle?”

  
"Oh yeah, and your dumb car drives stick. Yet another stupid wave your bigger penis metaphor. So macho. So dickwad full of yourself. I hate you. I'm leaving this shithole for reals."

He knows Loki's not talking about him, but he's not sure if it's Odin or Tony Stark he's hating on right now. He doesn’t ask where Loki would have run away to. He’s glad Harvard’s waitlisted him if it means it’ll keep Loki from bolting straight for Boston, and Tony Stark. But Tony Stark hasn't swung around in ages. They don't call or anything. It's not like they're cute little boyfriends with pinky swears and promise rings.

  
"Oh yeah? And you'll live on what? Playing online poker?"  
  
"Yeah, I'll be SweetPussy96. That'll be my digital strippername."  
  
Thor laughs at him, and Loki's sort of laughing too, only there's no real laugh, and just a little bit of a sigh.  
  
“I’m glad you can’t drive,” says Thor finally. “I’d miss you if you were gone.”

Loki cranes his head to look at him, like Thor’s the dumbest thing in the world, and it’s an even greater insult that Thor got into Harvard and _he_ didn’t.

“I can always take _the bus,_ Thor,” says Loki, and leans his head on Thor’s shoulder. “Idiot.” He fidgets in his seat, cranky, and sucks on his bleeding fingertips. "I'm hungry."  
  
"There's casserole in the fridge."  
  
"I'm _cheeseburger_ hungry," he says. "Buy me a burger."  
  
Thor gives a pointed look at the wires hanging out of the electrical system, and Loki scrunches his nose and makes a face, muttering something under his breath. Something stupid like, _Tony would have gotten me a burger._  
  
"Buy your own burger," growls Thor, and yanks his bratty kid brother out of the car. 

But he's got the keys to Frigga's Landrover, and they sneak out to Burger King and get double cheeseburgers from the drive-thru and eat them in the parking lot. Thor ends up paying anyway.

After that, things are sort of okay. That is until Tony Stark runs away from MIT and goes missing for a week.

 

 


End file.
